Students Preparing For Rare Opportunity To Visit Soviet Union Group To Tour Moscow, Other Cities

March 11, 1988|by PETE LEFFLER, The Morning Call

Jessica Bonner's head was buried in her homework as the morning announcements washed over the students in her Southern Lehigh High School homeroom.

Like her classmates, the 17-year-old junior half-listened to the daily drone of school news until a name caught her ear.

Walt Tremer, perhaps the district's best-known teacher and the mentor of her advanced classes since fourth grade, was planning a school trip.

Not just any trip: Tremer was proposing to lead a dozen students into the Soviet Union as non-governmental United States ambassadors, taking advantage of the new Soviet spirit of "glasnost" or openness.

Later that day at a meeting after school, 30 kids rushed Tremer's desk when he asked for commitments. They did so despite the two-week trip's $2,000 cost and, in Bonner's case at least, without checking with home first.

"I guess I sort of trusted that if Mr. Tremer was involved, it would be really neat," Bonner said.

She told her mother, Jean Parker, that night. Within minutes Parker had Tremer on the telephone and was volunteering as a chaperone . . ..

On Sunday, the teacher, his long-time pupil and her mother will board an international flight along with 43 other Southern Lehigh students, four more adults and a television crew.

A community send-off is planned for 7 tonight at Coopersburg borough hall.

For those aboard the Finair aircraft, the long flight east will end weeks of whirlwind preparations and will start a two-week cultural exchange far behind the Iron Curtain.

The Southern Lehigh delegation represents the first group to take advantage of the opportunity for a rare glimpse behind the political face of a country President Reagan once labeled an "evil empire."

"In this day of changing political perspectives, the youth of all countries stand as the hope of the future," Tremer said. Recognizing that, the Soviet government "has opened the door of educational sharing for Soviet and American students."

A New York organization, the Citizens Exchange Council, arranged the trip.

Amid sightseeing tours of Moscow, Minsk and Leningrad, the American students will have opportunities to reach out with heartand soul to their Soviet peers - and beyond.

Segments of their visit will be covered by Soviet television stations.

The students will share classrooms, dinner tables and dance floors with their Soviet hosts. Joint teams of American and Soviet students will compete in sporting events.

And the students will exchange ideas at a "World Leadership Conference."

Nighttime options include visiting the circus, the ballet, the theater and a nightclub with the Soviet version of rock 'n' roll.

For weeks the Southern Lehigh students have been preparing for the trip. They've learned basic Russian language and practiced songs.

They've developed photo essays, made historical booklets and sewn a quilt to present in Minsk. They've collected mementos, including unique pins, for their hosts.

On top of that, they've held raffles to help defray the cost.

Bonner's education about things Soviet began near home. While selling raffle tickets she encountered hostility from some mall shoppers.

"Some people came up and said: 'I wouldn't help out the Russians' and, 'I don't want any of them visiting here,' " she said.

Although taken aback, Bonner was not surprised at the reaction of a few. Most others supported the concept of the trip, she said.